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Updated: June 10, 2025
Without any reference to Don Diego, he divided the coast of Darien into two great provinces, separated by an imaginary line running through the Gulf of Uraba, appointing Alonzo de Ojeda governor of the eastern province, which he called New Andalusia, and Diego de Nicuessa governor of the western province, which included the rich coast of Veragua, and which he called Castilla del Oro, or Golden Castile.
He finally reached the eastern extremity of Uraba. This is called Caribana, because it is from this country that the insular Caribs derive their origin, and have hence kept the name. Hojeda's first care was to provide protection, and to this end he built a village defended by a fort.
Many rivers flow into the Gulf of Uraba, one of which, called the Darien, they say, is more fortunate than the Nile. The Spaniards decided to settle upon its green banks where fruit trees grow. The river bed is narrow and its current sluggish. The people along the banks were much amazed to see the brigantine, so much larger than their own barques, under full sail.
Their exploration of the country convinced the Spaniards that the eastern part of Uraba was richer and more fertile than the western. They therefore divided their forces and, with the assistance of a brigantine, transported one half of their people thither, the other half remaining on the eastern coast. The gulf is twenty-four miles long, growing narrower as it penetrates inland.
In the summer they have houses on the ground, as in other places; in the winter they dwell upon the trees, where they build very artificial towns and villages, as it is written in the Spanish story of the West Indies that those people do in the low lands near the gulf of Uraba.
Herrera, in the 7th and 8th books of the first Decade, fixes the foundation of San Sebastian de Uraba at the beginning of 1510, and mentions it as the most ancient town of the continent of America, after that of Ceragua, founded by Columbus in 1503, on the Rio Belen.
Shall I say nothing about the extent of the continent from east to west, or of its breadth from north to south, nor of anything that is reported concerning those regions as yet unknown? Let us return, therefore, Most Holy Father, to Uraba, and begin by stating the new names which have been given to those provinces, since they have come under the authority of Christians.
While Nicuesa, with a handful of wretched creatures, struggled in this manner against ill fortune, rivalry for the command broke out in Uraba. A certain Vasco Nuñez Balboa who, in the opinion of most people, was a man of action rather than of judgment, stirred up his companions against the judge Enciso, declaring that the latter possessed no royal patents giving him judicial powers.
Everything the Spaniards sowed or planted in Uraba grew marvellously well. Is this not worthy, Most Holy Father, of the highest admiration? Every kind of seed, graftings, sugar-canes, and slips of trees and plants, without speaking of the chickens and quadrupeds I have mentioned, were brought from Europe. O admirable fertility!
We have already spoken enough about these sea-animals and their eggs, which luxury-loving people stupidly prefer to the eggs of chickens or ducks. Let us add some further details outside our subject. We have above described the entrance to the Gulf of Uraba, and said the different countries washed by its waters were strangely different from one another.
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